The War for Our World
by StealthStar
Summary: In a world much like our own, life goes on like normal; except for 12-year-old Grey, who is preparing for the apocalypse. The Martian invasion of 1894 is just one more event in history fueling her adamant beliefs, despite the criticism of her parents and peers. But when she is proved correct, can she and everyone else survive the coming catastrophe? Two parts: "Impact" & "Conflict
1. Prologue

The year was 2012, early on in the 21st century. "The Apocalypse IS Here!" newspaper headlines shouted, as cities burned and charred corpses lined the streets. Those who stayed were dead; of those who fled, most died.

That was five years ago.

I was born in 2000, a year of great technological advances that seemed to signal a century of them. Sure, the economy was down, and the world was as much in conflict as ever, but as far as middle-class Americans were concerned life was about as normal as it got.

My childhood was normal. I grew up on a familiar suburban street, surrounded by friends who went to the local public school with me. There was nothing to be afraid of, except perhaps the dark and the occasional spider.

In school I was always interested in history, and so of course I learned about the Martian invasion of the 19th century. Everyone knew about it, but it was ancient history. Earth diseases had driven them away, and they hadn't shown themselves in more than two hundred years. We were safe in the comfort that that particular danger had been permanently averted.

Not to say that governments didn't take precautions against another invasion from space; but with time, their concern seemed to fade. With the founding of NASA there was a slight increase in protection in our atmosphere, but that, too, faded. There were more pressing concerns, like the World Wars and, later, the conflict in the Middle East. No longer were drills for the Black Gas required in school or homes, and making bunkers had gone out of fashion long ago. The only people who still prepared for a terror that took place two centuries ago were the same eccentrics touting the existence of the Loch Ness monster. Nobody paid them any mind; no reason to, not when the event was so far back in time, and seemed to unlikely to happen again.

Years passed, as quickly as ever, and soon I was twelve years old. The year was 2012, and every other kid in my sixth grade class was abuzz with conspiracy theories concerning the end of the world. They joked about it often, theorizing about whether it would be vampires or zombies that would bring about the sunset of mankind.

I was also interested in a possible apocalypse, but more seriously than any of my peers. I studied the great tragedies of history, anything that I thought had a possibility of occurring again. Reading through book after book, through first hand accounts and historical documents, I compiled all of the information I could on every possibility. I kept all of this information in a small book, one I never let out of my sight. I hardly had any friends; people thought I was strange, and my parents declared my obsession as unhealthy. They were about to make me see a shrink when the events of December, 2012 proved all of them wrong…


	2. Impact: Chapter 1

Book One: Impact

"So, I'm looking for a Black Smoke mask, preferably the later models from the 1960s. Got any of those?"

The man behind the counter stared at me with mouth agape, probably wondering what a twelve-year-old Goth girl was doing in his pawnshop asking for such a strange object. "Uh…" he said dumbly, as I stood tapping my combat boot against the grimy linoleum floor. "We might have something like that in the basement," he eventually stammered. "Let me go check."

He left the front counter, and I took a look around as I waited. Being a standard downtown pawnshop there was nothing of any real interest to me, just a bunch of useless junk. However, it was the last place I had to ask for a Black Smoke mask, so I was hoping it would come through. Soon enough he returned, and to my pleasure he was holding a large metal object in his hands.

"This what you want?" he asked, setting it on the counter in front of me. I ran my hands over the smooth, cold, and admittedly dusty metal with a thrill. It was a Black Smoke mask alright, made entirely of metal so that it couldn't deteriorate with time or toxins. It was also a '66 model, one of the best ever made.

"How much for it?" I asked gleefully, holding the mask as if it could save my life; which, I believed, it could.

The man looked at it and shrugged. "Dunno, that piece hasn't been looked at for years. Maybe five bucks?" I happily handed over part of last week's allowance and took the mask. I walked out of the store, finding myself on one of the back streets of downtown. Though my parents didn't know (and would never approve), I spent a good deal of my time after school walking down streets like this. It was the 'shady' pawnshops that had the best stuff, and they were only found in the more abandoned parts of town.

Humming a little bit of nothing to myself, I walked around the corner and headed back home. I had time; there were always a good couple of hours between when school got out and my parents got home from work. I thought it was great; there was always something I wanted to do in those hours that could not be done in their company. They never did understand.

I hitched my backpack up and increased my grip on the mask as I approached my family's apartment building. Despite my preferences, we lived on a higher floor, and I took the stairs as usual. People, especially my parents, called me paranoid because I wouldn't use elevators. Personally, I didn't see anything wrong with not wanting to get in a metal box that cannot be escaped from and it easily broken. I was always prepared to have an exit strategy, it was just how my mind worked.

But for some reason, that characteristic seemed to make me… wrong in other people's eyes. My cousin explained it to me like this: I simply saw the world, and its potentials, in a different way than most. The way she said it, it didn't seem bad; but according to my parents, it was a problem of mine that should be fixed, and soon.

"Whatever," I muttered to myself, fitting the key into my front door. Just because I was twelve didn't mean I was stupid. Still, these kind of thoughts happened every day, whether I wanted them to or not.

Closing the front door behind me I found my way to my bedroom, past the 'No Trespassing' sign on my door and the caution tape just past it. I dumped my backpack on the floor and slid open my closet door. Sitting at the back of my closet was a set of duffel bags- my survival kits. In my research I had pinpointed the four most likely catastrophes to occur in the near future, and had made survival bags set up specifically for them. My parents didn't know of course; they would have taken them away from me, and that was unthinkable.

Each one contained basic survival supplies: a complete change of clothes in preparation for cold or hot weather, a utility pocket knife, at least a week's worth of non-perishable food, sealed cases of water, a roll of duct tape, a small bedroll, and a tarp. Things I couldn't split up, like my cache of money and my cell pone, were in a small bag that could easily be put into the others if need be. The bags themselves contained tools specific to the situation; I put the Black Smoke mask into the bag labeled 'Second Coming of the Martians' and zipped it up again, closing the closet door.

Flopping on my bed, I reached into my jacket pocket and pulled out my journal and pen. Opening it to the correct page I wrote:

_Bought Black Smoke mask- in very good shape, still sealed. Even better, my allowance isn't decimated this time. Library book still isn't in._

With that done I shoved it back in my pocket. I always had my journal by my side- I slept with it under my pillow. It contained everything I knew, all of the potentials, what worked and what didn't. The journal was my lifeline. Something else I never let my parents see, lest they take it away. Still, they knew that it existed; they just didn't know what I wrote in it, as I called it my personal diary. Even my parents wouldn't go so far as to read something like that.

Within the hour I heard my mom come home from work. "Grey, sweetie?" she said through my door. She had stopped coming into my room a while ago. I think it scared her. "Dinner will be ready in a bit, okay? Are you doing your homework?"

"Yes, mom," I replied loudly. "I don't have much, I'm almost done."

"Okay…" she replied. "Make sure you're finished by the time your father gets home, he doesn't like to see you cooped up in your room."

"Yeah, whatever," I muttered to myself as she walked away. Like I cared what my father liked or didn't like.

I had finished my homework and was listening to metal music when my mother returned. "Grey!" she yelled through the door, trying to shout over the music. "Come and sit down for dinner!"

With a sigh I turned off the music and stood up, walking out of my bedroom. My mom was standing there waiting for me with a strained smile. "Why do you _insist_ on always straightening you hair?" she asked, fingering my long black hair as we walked to the kitchen.

"Dunno," I replied curtly, brushing her hand away and sitting down heavily in my chair. She frowned but didn't respond. I looked up to see my father eyeing me and I bit my lip, feeling a bit guilty for being so cold. Still, they kept trying to change me, and I hated it.

The two of us waited in silence as Mom set up the meal, my father still looking at me as I avoided eye contact. She sat down and led us in grace, which I mumbled my way through, and then started passing around the food. She and my father talked to each other as they ate, whiled I stayed slouched in my chair picking disinterestedly at my food.

"Blair is coming to visit in a couple of days," my mother said, and immediately I became interested in the conversation.

"Blair is coming to see us?" I asked excitedly. Blair was my cousin, my favorite one; she was going to college in another state, so she didn't come to see us that often. Still, she was the only relative I had that actually liked me for myself. Never once had she thrown my personality or interests in a bad light, which made her much more enjoyable to hang out with.

My mother smiled; she had always approved of Blair, and thought she was a good influence on me. "Yes, she's coming on Wednesday. I think she wants to visit the city during the day and stay with us in the evenings."

"Sweet," I replied, thinking of all the fun things we could do together. This was going to make the week so much better.

The next morning my alarm went off as usual, and I got up to get ready for school. I came to breakfast with my backpack slung over my shoulder, hoping to grab some toast and set off before my mother could intervene. Unfortunately both of my parents were already seated, and my mom made me sit down and eat a 'real' breakfast.

My father was sipping on his coffee and reading the morning paper as usual. He grunted in distaste and threw it on the table. "Nothing interesting today," he declared. "The writers just kept going on about how Mars is slipping behind the sun in it's orbit. As if that impacts anyone here!"

My ears perked up at this tidbit of information, if only because Mars was still on my mind from the day before. I didn't show any interest, however, and finished my breakfast in silence. "See ya," I said, picking up my backpack and striding towards the door.

"Have a good day!" my mom called after me, almost hopefully.

"Yeah, that's probably not going to happen," I said under my breath, closing the door behind me. I shoved my hands in my pockets and walked down the stairs, hoping I was in time to catch the bus. School wasn't exactly great for me; I was pretty much the class freak, the crazy one that nobody dared talk to for fear of social isolation. Add that to the boring classes and over-disciplinary teachers, and that's a mix I couldn't wait to leave. Overall, it kind of sucked.

I made it to the metro, paid at the front, and sat down in the back corner. As the doors shut and the bus rumbled into movement I pulled out my journal. What my father had said at breakfast was definitely worth writing down.

_Mars is in orbit behind the sun- away from Earth's view. A very dangerous position, one that only happens rarely. I should keep my eyes and ears out for other astronomical news, whether from Mars or the Sun. Until then, I cannot wait for Blair to come. Maybe I can tell her about this news…_


	3. Impact: Chapter 2

Before long Blair had arrived, and I was spending all of my time (outside of school, of course) in her company. She didn't mind; she told me in secret that I was the reason she came to visit. "I missed you," she said, enveloping me in a hug. "It's been way too long. So, how are you? What's new in the life of Grey?"

I smiled, something I don't usually do; but she deserved it. "I found a Black Smoke mask. It was only five bucks."

Her eyes widened; unlike everybody else I knew, Blair actually had all of the information I did and knew why I researched it. "That's a good deal," she said. "I bet those are really hard to find." She paused, then added, "That's the gas mask-looking thing you showed me on Google, right?"

I nodded, laughing a bit. Okay, so I may tell her most everything, but that didn't mean she had my passion (or memory) for stuff like this. "Yep, you got it. I had to look everywhere for one, but I eventually got my hands on it. Want to see?" I asked her, stepping off my bed and making my way to the closet.

"Sure!" she said with a grin, sitting cross-legged and leaning against the head-board of my bed. "How's school going? 7th grade treating you okay?"

My face fell a bit at the mention of school, but I didn't let her see. If Blair had any idea that I didn't have a single friend, she would probably go to the school board over it. I eventually settled on, "It's all right, I guess," and handed her the Black Smoke mask.

Blair ran her hands over it, an awed expression on her face. Though she wasn't necessarily interested in apocalypses, my cousin absolutely loved history. "So cool," she muttered, fingering the plastic. "You have to like some part of school. What's your favorite class? History?"

"No, actually," I said with a smile, carefully packing away the mask once more. "I'm taking Astronomy this year, so that's my favorite."

"No way! Astronomy, that's so cool. I'm taking this college class…" We kept talking like this, casual and comfortable, until I had to go to bed. I fell asleep that night happy for the first time in a while. Thoughts of Mars and the quickly approaching date of the apocalypse were far from my mind for once.

Of course, that peace wouldn't last.

"Current events? Anybody?" the teacher asked. I sat in the back of the class with an empty chair by my side; nobody wanted to be my partner, not that I cared. I was in my usual scholarly position, my chin resting in my hand, my eyes half closed. Hardly anything interested me anymore and, since I could ace every test using the textbook, listening (or even further, participating) in class seemed like a waste of time and energy.

I saw the girl in front of me turn and steal a glance my way when she thought I wasn't looking. "Don't you think that Grey would talk in this class?" she whispered to the boy next to her, twirling a lock of strawberry blond hair around her finger. "I mean, in this class the teacher actually likes her, right?"

The boy scoffed, making no effort to be quiet. Knowing Derrick, he probably wanted me to hear whatever he had to say. "Grey-the-Fey? She never says anything. Just hides behind that creepy black hair of hers."

The girl, Anna, looked at me again with a frown. "But she aces all of the tests! I bet she could answer every question."

Derrick slung an arm around her shoulders, making her look away. "Don't worry about that freak," he told her. "You don't want to associate with someone like her. And she won't talk to you anyways, so what's the point?" I shot a glare at him before tuning back into class so I could ignore his blatant douchebaggery.

"Has anybody heard about the solar flares they spotted yesterday?" the teacher asked, a wide smile on her face. The class was silent; obviously, nobody had. "NASA satellites spotted unusual solar flares yesterday, each exactly two hours apart. This activity is highly unusual, as were the structure of the flares." By now I was listening in actual interest as she pulled up some pictures from the NASA website. "Most solar flares look like flames," she continued, "these, on the other hand, appear to be jets of gas propelled laterally from the sun."

My heart thumping I frantically grasped in my jacket pocket for my journal. Flipping to an earlier page, I found a picture drawn in 1894 by an English observatory worker; a picture which was found later to depict the launching of a Martian cylinder. Though the picture in my notebook was black-and-white and simply an illustration, it held a striking resemblance to the NASA picture currently on the board. Add this to the regularity of the flares and the fact that Mars was currently behind the sun, and you've got a no-so-coincidental recipe for disaster.

Sure, there were some differences. Like the flares being every two hours in contrast to every twenty four. But Earth technology has excelled tremendously in the last few centuries, why couldn't theirs have too? Of course, nobody else in the class put two and two together as I scribbled madly in my journal. In fact, some of them looked at me strangely, as if they couldn't fathom what had suddenly got me so excited.

"Why're you so worked up, freak?" Derrick asked, leaning back in his chair to stare at me. Anna was looking at me with wide eyes as well, though probably because she was worried I was writing down some homework assignment she missed.

I shot him a look, but didn't say anything and went back to the important task of chronicling these events. I had learned long ago that no matter what you said, they would turn it against you. It was much better to stay silent and imagine throwing your fury at them.

"Oh, this is about the 'apocalypse', isn't it?" Derrick said tauntingly. My eyes immediately widened. How had _he_, of all people, put it together? "I should have known. Tomorrow's the 21st of December, that's the doomsday for you conspiracy theorists, isn't it?"

Well, that's two things made certain. One, Derrick is not a genius, he's still just a jerk. An aware jerk, but a jerk nonetheless. Two, the cylinders were arriving tomorrow. The day the Mayan calendar ended. A total reset of the planet Earth.

The apocalypse was almost here.

The bell rang, startling me out of my racing thoughts. Stuffing my journal in my pocket I quickly packed up and left the classroom, headed to my locker. I put everything back in it, not bothering to take anything out. After tomorrow, schoolwork wouldn't matter anymore. I would have just skipped and gone home, but until the end of the world my parents could still ground me, and I needed free reign to be able to prepare.

"What's wrong, freak?" a familiar voice asked from behind me.

With a scowl I shut my locker door and turned around. "What do you want, Derrick?" I growled. At a time like this, he was the last person I wanted to talk to.

He gave me a smirk as Anna stared at me from behind him. She had probably thought I was a mute up until now. "I just want to know if you have any advice," he said derisively. "After all, you've been a freak since we were in elementary school. Surely you know what to do for the 'big day'?"

Though I knew he was just trying to make fun of me, I actually considered his words. After all, nobody deserved to die; the least I could do was five them some idea of what was going on. Anna especially was an innocent soul, not a cruel bone in her. "Watch the sky," I eventually said, "and pack the essentials. Once the cylinders land, the war (if you can call it that) will begin."

Derrick looked at me for a beat, then laughed so loud that other students in the hall turned to look at him. "You… you actually believe that?" he exclaimed, still cracking up at my expense. Not that I had ever expected him to believe me, but still.

"Always have," I responded coldly, and walked away. "Fine, die with the rest. See if I care." If he wasn't interested in listening, I wasn't interested in talking. All my life I had been surrounded by skeptics, and tomorrow my day would come; but I wasn't happy about it. The end of life as we know it isn't exactly something to celebrate.

The rest of the day passed by painfully slowly. My attention in class was even more absent than usual because I was mentally checking and re-checking my supplies at home. Still, seconds felt like minutes, minutes hours. At the end of school I practically ran out of the classroom, not bothering who yelled at me in the hallways. I was on my way to the bus stop when I heard my name.

"Grey!" somebody shouted over the noise of students. I turned to find Blair waving at me from her car. Turning on my heel I sped over, practically leaping into the passenger seat. "I thought I'd pick you up from school today!" she said happily, starting the car.

"Drive," I curtly responded, curling up my knees and hugging them. "I have a lot to tell you."


	4. Impact: Chapter 3

"It's not that I don't believe you," Blair said slowly. "It's just, I don't want to believe…" She looked at my aghast face in apology as we drove home.

"I can't believe you're like this too," I said darkly, glowering out the window. The one person in my life who I thought would understand turned out to be just as blind as everyone else. "I thought you trusted me."

Blair looked hurt at this, and I immediately regretted adding that. "I _do_ trust you, Grey," she said softly, almost pleadingly. "But it's a hard idea to wrap my head around, you know? It's not like I want the world to end tomorrow." By now we had arrived at the apartment, so I suspended the conversation in case one or both of my parents were home.

To my surprise, they actually were. "Didn't you guys have work today?" I asked warily, eyeing the couple seated at our kitchen table. Usually my parents weren't home for a good hour or so.

"We thought we would take off early today," my mom said, embracing me in an unexpected hug. My eyes were wide as saucers from surprise as she released me. "With Blair visiting I thought we could have dinner as a family!"

"Aw, Aunt Marie, you shouldn't have," said Blair with a smile. I was still standing, dumbfounded, with my backpack in my hands. Since when did we operate as a normal family?

"I'm gonna go drop my backpack in my room," I mumbled, shuffling towards the hallway. Getting into my room I shut the door and took a deep breath. My brain was so overloaded by thoughts of the approaching events that I could hardly process anything else.

Throwing my backpack to the side I opened the closet door; but I had hardly touched my survival bag before my mom knocked on the door. "Grey," she said, "if you're done putting away your backpack I would appreciate you spending time with the family."

"Okay, I'll be out in a sec," I replied, but inwardly I was cursing my luck. I had so much preparation to do, I didn't have time for dumb family stuff! But I paused as a thought struck me, my hand frozen over the door handle. After tomorrow, my life with my family as I knew it would be a thing of the past. I should probably enjoy the normalcy while it lasted.

Family time and dinner lasted forever, but I ended up enjoying it regardless of my stress. For one night, we were truly a happy family. Blair felt more like my sister than my cousin, to the loneliness I was used to feeling seemed to slip away. As far as "last meals" go, it was definitely the best. It was as if we all knew that something life-changing was going to happen tomorrow, so we had better make the night count.

After we had cleared the dishes, however, the adults fell to talking and I excused myself to my room. Throwing open the closet door I grabbed the correct survival bag and began double-checking it. I also grabbed my wallet and phone, sealing them in a waterproof bag before throwing it in with the rest. For a second I glanced over at the other three bags, wondering if anything in them would be useful. Eventually I decided that, given the Martian advance, the other scenarios were highly unlikely. Better to focus on the supplies at hand.

"Grey?" a voice asked from the hallway. The door proceeded to open, meaning the question didn't come from one of my parents. Sure enough, it was Blair who made her way past the caution tape and into my room. I stood up to talk to her. "I'm going back to my hotel," she said softly, her eyes showing that she still felt bad about our argument earlier. "I just wanted to say good night."

"Here," I said, shoving a bundle into her arms. She looked surprised and confused, so I explained. "I made a survival bag for you. It has all the essentials." I had taken one of the other duffel bags and removed my clothing and the special equipment, leaving only the basics. My parents wouldn't take one, but Blair might.

"Grey… I don't know what to say…" Blair replied, her expression unfathomable.

I smiled at her, repairing the bond between us with one easy motion. "Say you'll pack your stuff in it and meet me at Starbucks tomorrow morning. The one on the corner, 9 o'clock." I had no intention of going to school tomorrow, and it wouldn't help us to be scattered.

Blair looked at me warily. "Don't you have class?" she asked.

"I have a free period," I quickly lied. Whatever got her to agree.

She gave me a calculating look, but in the end said, "All right, I'll be there."

"Great!" I exclaimed, practically pushing her out the door. "Now do get some sleep. And don't forget to pack!"

"Okay, okay!" Blair said, laughing her way out the door. "Good night, Grey."

"Night!" I replied with a grin, waving to her as she walked down the hall. I said good night to my parents as well and closed my bedroom door.

With a sigh I leaned against the wall and slid down to the floor. I wasn't completely worried about tomorrow; after all, I was more prepared than anybody. Regardless, the difficulties of balancing two lives at once were quickly becoming apparent. A part of me hoped that I was wrong, that no cylinders would crash to the Earth tomorrow.

But as I fell asleep that night, I knew what the coming day would bring. And as the sun set, I pondered the setting sun of mankind.

I woke up to my alarm like usual the next morning, and for a good minute was confused as to why I felt a sense of urgency. My eyes soon landed on my packed duffel bag, however, and it all came back with a rush. Today was the day. The Martians were coming.

Feeling infinitely more awake, I slipped out of bed and into the shower. After getting ready for the day, I packed up my toiletries into my already full duffel bag. I took one last look at myself in the mirror, remembering how I looked with straightened hair; there was no reason to waste space with my straightener, and I doubted I would have the time or the electrical access to do it anyways. And frankly, my hair would probably be the least of my worries.

Slinging my school backpack over my shoulders I strode out into the kitchen to grab breakfast. It was imperative that I pretend to go to school and wait for my parents to leave before grabbing my real supplies. Otherwise, nothing I had planned would work. "Morning," I said to my parents as I entered the kitchen. I went to go make some toast.

"Morning!" my mother replied in surprise, unused to me making my own food (or waking up on my own, for that matter). She herself was standing in the kitchen, seasoning a plate of scrambled eggs.

I sat down at the table with a thud, the freshly toasted bread sliding on my plate. With a yawn I twisted open the jar of strawberry jam, spreading a liberal amount atop my breakfast. "Exciting day of school ahead of you?" my father asked, eyes still glued to the morning paper.

"Should be," I muttered, thinking about the approaching aliens. After a few moments I had cleared my plate, and got up to go to the door.

"Well, have a nice day sweetheart," my mom said from the table while my father stayed reading his news. I turned to go and an unfamiliar thought came to me, one that started my heart thumping.

"Mom," I said quickly, pausing to turn back.

Naturally she looked mildly puzzled as she replied, "Hm?"

"I just… you know I love you guys, right?" I said curtly, flushing but not looking away. No room for unsaid words at the end of the world.

Mom smiled at me, unusually affectionate, and not in the nagging sort of way either. "We love you too," she said softly. And with that I closed the door.

I walked down the hall and down the stairs as usual, just like any other day. Once I reached the lobby of our apartment building I slipped into a conveniently hidden corner; from here I could see my parents leave for work without being noticed myself, and consequently know I was free to grab my bug-out bag from the room. Feeling secure in my plan I settled in. I hadn't long to wait: within a quarter hour they passed, my dad looking formal as usual with his tie and briefcase and my mother not much different. She was a secretary at the office building in which he worked; an office romance, they always told me. Not that I ever cared before, it was always awkward to think of your parents being passionately in love.

Once I was certain they had left and had not forgotten anything to come back for, I dashed back up the stairs. Quickly unlocking the recently locked door to the apartment I ran inside. I dropped my backpack on the floor without a thought; I wouldn't be needing it anytime remotely soon. Without pause I ran into my bedroom, slinging the duffel bag over my back and strapping it on tight. A flash of light caught the corner of my eye, drawing me to the window.

Streaking across the open blue sky was a trail of green, a strangely colored comet tearing the atmosphere as it descended. "So it begins," I whispered.

I bolted out the door without a backwards glance.


	5. Impact: Chapter 4

I opened the door to the coffee shop, quickly spotting Blair nursing a coffee at a table in the corner. The Starbucks was surprisingly void of customers for this time in the morning. Regardless, it would be empty soon enough.

"Morning," Blair greeted me with a smile, taking a sip of her coffee. I saw with pride that her backpack was sitting next to her, looking considerably fuller than when I had given it to her the previous night. "Want a coffee? It's on me."

"No time," I replied, still a bit tense. Seeing the comet coming down had been a shock, but I had conditioned myself to avoid panic at all costs. Reason and a clear head were key to survival. "We have to go, now."

There was commotion in the street, and we both turned to look out the window. On the sidewalks people were pointing and chattering to each other. Some cars had even stopped in the street; the cars behind them were the ones causing all the noise. Blair looked up at me, worry creeping up behind her eyes. "Grey?" she asked slowly. "What's going on out there?"

"Come look for yourself," I replied, already knowing what I would see. I started towards the door; Blair grabbed her coffee and her backpack and followed me out. Once we were clear of the building it was plain to see what all of the commotion was about. An enormous plume of smoke was rising from downtown, lit up occasionally by flashes of fire.

"Oh my god," Blair whispered, staring at it with wide eyes.

"The heat rays are already working," I muttered, not surprised at all. Considering how far our own technology had come, I expected theirs had leapt forward as well. Suddenly a thought struck me, and I paled. "Mom and Dad," I gasped. "Blair, Mom and Dad are still downtown! They'll believe me now, we have to go get them!" I took off down the street towards the pillar of smoke.

Blair looked away from the horrific sight, yelling, "Are you crazy? Grey, wait!" She started running after me, and I slowed down just enough so as not to lose her as we sprinted through the alleys.

Soon enough the amount of people going the other way greatly increased as panic started spreading. I pushed and shoved my way through the flood, muttering apologies as I went. Blair held onto my backpack so as not to lose me. Suddenly, it all stopped. No more people. Just hastily abandoned buildings and wailing car alarms. We had reached downtown.

"Grey," Blair muttered, still clutching my backpack tightly. "This seems dangerous. Maybe your parents already got out. You saw all those people, nobody in their right mind would stay here, so let's…"

"No," I said calmly.

"What?" Blair looked surprised.

"I said no. Their building is right at the center of downtown, they could be trapped or hurt." My voice remained relatively composed, but regardless my hands were shaking. There was a large difference between preparing for an invasion and experiencing one. And somehow, I hadn't expected my parents to be in harm's way.

"I… I guess so…" Blair said, her voice shaking. I wouldn't admit it, but I was pretty scared too.

"Come on," I whispered, and dragged her into the shadow of a building. Now focused on the job at hand all of my research kicked in, survival tips playing through my mind like a song on repeat. Keeping close to the empty buildings we snuck quietly into the heart of downtown.

The silence was eerie. It was not complete: there were dogs barking and alarms sounding. But there were no people, the only time I had ever seen the city streets so empty. Even at night this part of town was alive, so this just felt… wrong.

Suddenly, the sound of something large could be heard from the street in front of us. Fast-paced thumping seemed to make the entire road shudder; and without a doubt it was coming closer. "Hide!" I gasped, and pulled Blair into the nearest open door with me. It was a local restaurant, and we moved past food forgotten to crouch underneath a window. By some miracle Blair still had her coffee, and she raised it to her lips with shaking hands. The thumping grew closer, and I waited with a mix of anticipation and fear; for to be proved right meant the destruction of us all.

I didn't have to wait long to see it: the first tripod. Snippets of eyewitness accounts from the original event came back to me: "Can you imagine a milking stool tilted and bowled violently along the ground?" I could now. The tripod was like nothing I'd ever seen, like a strange animal turned machine. Metal moved as if it were flesh and blood, it's three legs hurrying it along at an impossible pace and it's glittering tentacles moving about as if tasting the very air. The entire contraption moved fluidly, like it was swimming through the air rather than walking upon the street. The top of it would swivel occasionally, scanning its domain. It was too tall to see it in its entirety, but from the glances I took I could see the heat ray snaking up behind its back, flexible and ready to fire.

Blair was seeing the same things I was, though I'm sure she understood them even less. At the moment she was biting a tightly clenched fist to keep from screaming, terror pulsing in her wide eyes. She held onto her coffee with an unyielding grip, as if it were her last lifeline. I held my breath as the tripod passed, wondering how sensitive their sound sensors were and hoping they hadn't invented a way to detect heat sources. I had a theory about that, but now wasn't really the time.

Within the course of a minute the Martian machine had passed us, and after two we could no longer hear the thumping of its legs. I let out a breath in relief and sagged against the wall, closing my eyes. Blair, on the other hand, was on the verge of panic.

"Grey," she hissed, nudging my shoulder. "Grey you were right I'm so sorry oh god did you see that thing it was like nothing I Grey are you listening we have to get out of here!"

"I'm listening," I calmly replied, keeping my voice down just in case. Opening my eyes and sitting up I took Blair by the shoulders, attempting to calm her down. "Listen, Blair." She stopped muttering and looked me in the eyes. "That was a tripod, one of the Martian's machines. I'm sure they have very advanced technology on their side, so we have to stay quiet and collected from now on, okay?" My cousin nodded nervously, glancing anxiously from me to the window. "Now I need to make sure that my parents are okay, so we have three more blocks to go. I need you to follow my lead and stay close to the buildings. Can you do that?"

Blair drew in a shaky breath, but replied, "Yes."

I nodded affirmatively a couple of times, trying to look more confident than I felt. "Come on," I whispered, and we moved out into the street once again. By now even the dogs had been silenced one way or another, but my ears still strained against the silence. The loud metallic thumping we had heard was the only way of predicting an approaching tripod; fortunately, there was no sound of the kind echoing through nearby streets.

We slunk against the buildings, moving stealthily from shadow to shadow. Blair walked on tiptoe behind me, a protective hand on my backpack. I counted the blocks as we went: one as we went past Illinois Ave, two as we arrived at… Main…

I stopped at the corner, unable to believe my eyes. With a sharp intake of breath I heard Blair walk up next to me; I didn't look over at her. Something else held my attention.

In front of me stood a mass of rubble and smoking wreckage, surrounding a circular crater spanning the length of the next two blocks. Blair and I stood at the very edge; the road not three feet in front of us ran with cracks before practically disintegrating into the sloping edge of the crater. And in the very center, at the very site of my parents' office building, stood an enormous, smoking cylinder of smooth metal. Around it swarmed smaller machines, about the size of vans but on legs, which seemed to be disassembling the fallen ship and building tripods in a rapid fashion.

My ears began to ring as the truth sunk in. My head swam, and my vision began to blur. Hardly feeling, I sluggishly turned around and began running back where we came from. Dimly I heard Blair yell after me, as if from the other side of a long tunnel. I felt detached, uncomprehending, like my body was working without me. Inside I was floundering, thoughts cycling through my mind in a constant stream.

_Not them not them oh god not them not them not them…_

After what seemed like an eternity I tripped over an edge, the pain of the concrete scraping my hands drawing me back into my body. I stayed on the ground, feeling for the first time the tears coursing down my cheeks. Staggering to my knees I crawled to a nearby bush, throwing up as my entire form began to shake. I felt gentle hands slowly removing my backpack, setting it to the side and rubbing my back soothingly.

"Shh," Blair's gentle, kind voice said softly. "Shh, Blair, it's okay honey, it's okay." She repeated this as I wiped my mouth and began to sob, curling into her. She ran her fingers through my tangled, matted hair, enveloping me in a warm embrace. "Everything will be okay."

It wasn't true, but I still felt better just hearing her say it. Just feeling gentle hands, knowing that despite what had just happened I still wasn't alone. I still had somebody who loved me, who looked out for me. Somebody who probably was in pain as well, but who would put that aside to care for me. And for the first time in a while, I let all of my feelings come out.

After a few minutes the sobs had quieted to hiccups, and eventually my cheeks dried. Blair removed her hands from my hair and looked down at me with a sad little smile. I wiped my eyes and detached myself from her, sitting back on my knees. "My parents are dead," I said quietly, finally putting into words what had been tearing me to pieces.

Blair's face immediately crumpled in agony and pity. "We don't know that!" she protested, almost desperately. "There were thousands of people in that crowd, we could have missed them, they could be looking-"

"Blair," I interrupted her quietly, my voice controlled and devoid of emotion. Every feeling I had seemed to have been washed away with the tears. "The cylinder fell directly on top of their building. You saw the wreckage, there is no possible way they could have gotten out in time. At least… at least their death was a quick one."

"Don't say that!" Blair exclaimed, her fists clenching and unclenching as she struggled between anguish and anger. "Don't! Just… don't." She closed her eyes and worked to compose herself. With a sigh she opened them and stood up, taking a look around. "Now where are we?" she wondered. Evidently I had run us into a part of the city unknown to her.

I stood up as well, absentmindedly brushing my cut-up hands on my jeans. Wincing a bit from the sharp pain that shot through them, I stuck them in my jacket pockets and tried to focus on the matter at hand. From what I could tell we had gone west, towards the outer edge of the city. A few more blocks of businesses and we would be in the suburbs. I turned to look at the building behind me. It was a movie theater, though it looked completely deserted at the moment. Money had even been left at the ticket booths.

_Note to self: collect money when Blair isn't looking_ I thought. One man's panic was another's profit, after all. My train of thought was interrupted, however, by a familiar shake in the ground and the distant sound of thumping. "A tripod's coming, come on!" I exclaimed, and after snatching up my bag Blair and I ran into the theater. We went past the exposed lobby and into the interior hallway, where I watched the light coming from the entrance warily.

But before the shadow of the tripod crossed it, I heard the door to the theater behind me creak slowly open.


End file.
